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After Stephen Colbert won the vote in NASA's contest to name a new module on the International Space Station, NASA found itself in a tough spot. According to Reuters, "Contest rules stipulate that the agency retains the right to basically do whatever it wants," but it may not be all that easy. At first NASA floated the idea of naming the new module's toilet "Colbert." But Last Thursday Congressman Chaka Fattah, D-Pa., urged the agency to respect the people's wishes. And Colbert turned up the heat on yesterday's weekly show: "So NASA, I urge you to heed Congressman Fattah's call for democracy in orbit. Either name that node after me, or I too will reject democracy and seize power as space's evil tyrant overlord. Ball's in your court."

He won the vote - that proves his point that he can cajole the (fifteen to seventeen year-old North American male) public into stuffing a ballot box.

I have to say that if he continues down this road, one he's clearly been down before, it signals the beginning of the end to those of us not wearing the jersey.

April Fools or no, give it up and be a man, Coal Bear. Rather than suggest something interesting or meaningful (I submt 'The Colbert Brown Eagle'), he perpetrated this out of pure vanity, and I for one,

He's doing this stuff to make a point. His entire character on the show exists facetiously to prove a point. I'm not going to explain it to you because you should be smart enough to figure it out for yourself. If you're not, then you don't deserve to understand the knowledge he's trying to impart. (See, this is kind of his point...I'm not going to tell you, you have to think for yourself.)

Colbert saved the African elephant from extinction. He did this by virtue of his theory that whatever happens to be on wikipedia represents the truth. He urged his viewers to vandalize the wiki entry for elephants to say that the elephant population had tripled over the last 6 month, so that once it was vandalized it would now be the truth and the elephants would be saved. Here is park of the history of the page:

Actually, he didn't get it named after him. Some country (Hungary, I think) had a contest to name a bridge. Colbert urged viewers to spam the contest with his name, and he won. However, they said they would only use his name if:1) he could demonstrate he was fluent in Hungarian, and2) he was dead.

Actually, the Hungarian ambassador came on his show, and gave him a plaque, or something, certifying that he had won the contest, and then specified that for them to actually name the bridge after him, Colbert had to speak Hungarian. Colbert demonstrated his fluency by knowing the "hid" was Hungarian for "bridge." The ambassador accepted that as meeting the first requirement, then told him that the second requirement was that he be dead, at which point Colbert acceded, and agreed to let them name the bridge after some Hungarian national hero.

Get back to the dungeons of wikipedia where you belong, and don't forget to polish the jackboots from your Fahrenheit 451 Fireman's uniform.

Name the station "Colbert".

The publicity will only do NASA good. It will help popularize space funding amongst an audience of political science students -- and likely future politicians, as well as a whole bunch of other people who simply don't care. Stephen is a friend of NASA, his audience isn't comprised of space geeks on the whole. Having Stephen get them interested in Space is a damned good thing. There is no loss in naming the station after him, no especial advantage in naming it serenity or anything else, but there is a substantial gain in naming it Colbert -- it just makes sense.

The thing is, Republicans tend to be bigger spenders on space than Democrats, particularly manned space flight. Democrats tend to argue that putting people in space is a luxury and we should be spending money on the poor, or, pursue unmanned flights for the science.

Republicans tend to argue that manned space flight is a national security thing. It doesn't hurt the cause that two of the largest Nasa facilities are in traditionally Republican areas - Texas and Florida.

... It doesn't hurt the cause that two of the largest Nasa facilities are in traditionally Republican areas - Texas and Florida.

I think you're confusing cause and effect here. The facilities were located there in the first place, along with the prospect of the industries that would grow up nearby, in exchange for the congressional votes to fund them. (It helps that Florida has the most rotational spin of the continental US, being closest to the equator, but that's just a bonus.)

It's a module, not the whole station. Name it, and take the publicity. Or make sensible rules, like we have for stamps and money, that we only name things for people dead long enough to have stable reputations. (gee, maybe that would help in other contexts as well . ..)

Rotational spin is great, but so is the fact that it has no land to the east of it, which means we have fewer risks of dropping disposable/reusable rocket bits on populated areas (since we launch in an eastward direction, normally).

Ha. You live in a strange world if you think giving something a name will suddenly make it popular. For a week, maybe. Then everybody will forget about it.

The reason space isn't as popular as it used to be is that nothing interesting is being done. Back when it got started it was very exciting. America vs the USSR. Things that had never been done before, being done with machines built on monumental scales. Lots of risk and danger, but lots of potential fame and prestige.

That is the sound of the significance of this event breaking the sound barrier as it passes over your head.

Colbert is a satirist. His job is to lampoon the establishment, popular culture, fad, etc, etc. He has just lampooned public voting competitions, which have been in vogue of late. Internet, SMS, email, telephone based, it doesn't matter. The bottom line is that these "votes" are little more than popularity contests decided by people with too much free time and little else to do with it. Colbert has simply shown how inherently vulnerable these votes are to manipulation. PZ Myers [pbs.org] has been doing this sort of thing for years.

Public poll competitions are a thinly disguised publicity stunt. Frequently, they simply demean and trivialize the event they are promoting. In the case of NASA, this poll has been a farce from day one. Even before Colbert, justifiably, entered the competition, the top contender for the module's name was "Serenity", an obvious reference to a recent sci-fi/fantasy show.

This was a billion dollar module meant for serious scientific research and NASA, itself a multi-billion dollar publicly funded institution, had chosen as it's first choice of name, that of a fictional spaceship from some bubblegum space opera made for teenagers, which pays only lip service to scientific fact and theory. This was a (supposedly) serious scientific and educational organization about to name a space station component after something that has never and can never exist. The level of unprofessionalism beggars belief.

What is anyone supposed to think of NASA after such a stunt? Is the whole organisation composed of people who base their ideas on TV shows and loopy ideas instead of hard theory? Considering the organization's continued stance on the Space Elevator concept, despite its proven absurdity over the course of over 50 years, I would have to say that, yes NASA is composed of juveniles who have their heads in the clouds and no idea how to get their actual bodies up there.

For get "Xenu". "Serenity" was and is the real problem. Frankly, Colbert has stepped in and dignified the proceedings by finally putting and end to the debacle. NASA will save itself a lot of face in the long run by naming the module "Colbert" as a reminder of their own folly. Naming it "Serenity" would be a permanent stain on whatever dignity the organization is supposed to have.

And organisation that allows idle tweenagers, teenagers and twenagers to name space modules, rockets, or satellites is an organisation that has no right to send such things into orbit.

So what would you call it? You could name it after a famous scientist or a scientific theory but that doesn't really engage with the average person. Alternatively you can give it a name based in a horribly contrived acronym which means nothing to anyone. Serenity might not be a terribly scientific name and the show certainly wasn't based on scientific fact but it is a name a large number of people interested in science are familiar with.

This was a billion dollar module meant for serious scientific research and NASA, itself a multi-billion dollar publicly funded institution, had chosen as it's first choice of name, that of a fictional spaceship from some bubblegum space opera made for teenagers, which pays only lip service to scientific fact and theory.

Fact #1: The test airframe of the Shuttle Orbiter was named Enterprise after a write-in campaign by Trekkies. Precedent has been set.Fact #2: There's no sound in space in Firefly, which is better than 99% of science fiction shows depict. Show some love.Fact #3: NASA could dearly use a Colbert bump.Fact #4: Firefly kicked ass. Neer-neer.

NASA should take this ball and run with it. It's lovely and whimsical farce that puts the agency in a mirthful light. One of the ISS astronauts already did a phone-in segment with Colbert. Last January we saw the clip of the Steelers fan up there waving his Terrible Towel in orbit.

This is a win-win sort of thing. Costs nothing, hurts nothing, gives people a smile when they think of a government agency that's gotten more press for fuckups than successes of late. The only kind of person who could be against this is some humorless old shit.

Oh come on now! The entire point of the show is he's satire of self promoting grandstanding media figures, I have to tell you this? He's also broadcast on cable in the US as well, right after The Daily Show, which he used to on. I think many of the people who don't like Colbert simply think he's being serious, when he's simply being incredibly serious about the satire. Only the court jester can tell the whole truthiness.

Oh, dear. I'm afraid your contribution violates our site's policy regarding Neutral Point of View and Verifiability. As a punishment, your account will be suspended for thirty days and you must wash my car.

If NASA were smart they would name the thing "Colbert" and encurage the chap to do a "ISS Report" or similar NASA/space oriented report on his show at regular intervals. Keep space research in front of the people. Even to the point of reporting on NASA's own humorous internal mistakes/problems/gaffs with actual data supplied by NASA. National / International attention and it costs them nothing.

I think Colber[t] actually pronounces his name as ColberT in private. This is based on me catching him one time on air saying ColberT when there was no comic reason for him to do so. ( I hate saying there's no comic reason for something since there is always the possibility that a joke flew by undetected ) It's unlikely that someone who had always pronounced their name one way would slip, though not impossible.

The name of a pod has no effect on it's usefulness. It's just a freaking name! Being named Colbert or Xenu (which would have been funnier than Colbert) is really immaterial to any science, like studying the effects of weightlessness on Twinkie shelf life, that they do up there.

What's wrong with humor in space? It's part of putting people in space. Humor and satire comes with them.

It's interesting to wonder about who exactly is pissed about a space station module being named Colbert.. Xenu would have been easy to dismiss for religious tolerance reasons, even people who hate scientology may legitimately be offended by someone poking fun at them, but the name Colbert isn't obviously offensive in any way. Yet the offense exists, or there would be no challenge to the nodule being named Colbert. The interesting question is who is being offended?

Serenity seems to have less offense value than Colbert. If it had won on it's own merits, nobody would have objected, and it wouldn't have even made the news. The people who are offended by the nodule being named Colbert aren't offended by Serenity.

I think there are people for whom space is sort of a religion. It's like a girl they've built up in their minds to some ideal that nobody can ever live up to. In their imagination, it has to them all the attributes they need it to have to be their holy land, the place where all their favorite sci-fi stories took place. And mere mortals can't go there - only NASA annointed astronaughts, so nothing ever happens there to destroy their preconceptions of the holy place.

Yeah, it's a girl and a religion. The probes NASA sends are like these folks' dingaling. Naming one of their nodules Colbert is like painting their dingaling pink.

These people need to snap out of it, and a pink dingaling paintjob is just the ticket. When and if people really start to live and work in space, outer space will offer just as many wedgies and swirlies to these people as earth has justly given them. These people need to realise this and work to correct the here and now, and not wait for the prophesised heavenly age of outer space where losers are cool for being losers. Believe me, the folks really doing things in space, aren't these people. They are winners of a game requiring non-loserness. The people these people worship are more like a boy band with a fanbase of stupid thirteen year old girls. These losers are the thirteen year old girls who have gone off the deep end - not the average fan. These losers are the drunken sports fans who paint their hairy chests, backs and beer bellies blue to cheer on their favorite football team shirtless while it snows.

Somehow, these people are being given more importance than they deserve. They are the base, they make the party. NASA uses these devout space-cultists as pillars of it's church. Without them, they'd have no cult. For that reason, NASA is afraid to alienate them. But that's exactly what they should do, since they alienate everyone else.

I think Colber[t] actually pronounces his name as ColberT in private. This is based on me catching him one time on air saying ColberT when there was no comic reason for him to do so. ( I hate saying there's no comic reason for something since there is always the possibility that a joke flew by undetected ) It's unlikely that someone who had always pronounced their name one way would slip, though not impossible.

SC has stated in interviews that the family pronounces it with the hard T. His father wanted to use (revert to?) the French pronounciation, but did not do so in deference to HIS father. So, in honor of his (by then) late father, SC changed from the hard T as he left South Carolina to go to Northwestern.
</anecdote>

If NASA were smart they would name the thing "Colbert" and encurage the chap to do a "ISS Report" or similar NASA/space oriented report on his show at regular intervals. Keep space research in front of the people. Even to the point of reporting on NASA's own humorous internal mistakes/problems/gaffs with actual data supplied by NASA. National / International attention and it costs them nothing.

While I don't disagree with the idea, aren't they pretty much getting this for free from Colbert already? Sure,

....they would refuse to give into the Colbert, and the resulting broohaha will give them publicity that money simply can't buy. The fly in the ointment, of course, is that now the congressman who can impact their funding, is on Colbert's side, so they wouldn't want to piss him off. Of course, he may be a smart congressman too, and may be after the publicity that results from Nasa not giving in - it would certainly raise his public profile.

I understand why NASA put a clause into the rules stating that it can do whatever it wants... There needs to be a way out in case some yahoos try to name the station something inappropriate, however there is nothing wrong with Colbert. It's one thing to put the literature into the rules to make sure that the name of the new module isn't "Enola Bay" and another thing to just change the name on a whim because a few people at NASA were hoping on "Serenity". Sounds a little petty to me.

I wouldn't be surprised if they justify things by saying simply that the people that were actually interested in naming the module, voted Serenity, and that was the point of the vote, not to see who could dig up the most voters for unrelated reasons. Really, they didn't vote to name the module after Colbert, they voted to do what Colbert asked them to do, with absolutely no interest in what it was.

Based on that it would seem like a good compromise to name the module Serenity, yet name some significant part or component of the module after Colbert.

Because really in 2 months very few of those that voted Cobert are going to care one way or the other about it, they'll have already moved on to Colbert's next PR stunt. There's no reason for the rest of the planet to be stuck with the stunt's legacy. The people that voted Serenity do care and have an interest in its future.

This is probably the first time I have EVER seen anything even remotely approaching a good justification-by-example for the electoral college.

Actually with slightly more retrospect on this, I think the entire group that wrote in Colbert shouldn't even count. They didn't vote. They did what Colbert asked them to do. Someone that actually votes is expressing an opinion on an issue. This group that wrote in Colbert weren't expressing their opinion, they were just doing what he asked them to to. If he had asked them to write in "MrColbert" instead of "Colbert", then MrColbert would have won. None of them had any actual interest in "Colbert" bei

I'm not so sure about what you're saying. I think there is a significant difference between a campaign ad that affects people's votes because it colors their view of what's in their own interest (how campaign ads in real elections work, and a valid part of the election process), vs. Colbert's request that affects votes of people who have no interest in the matter. If you don't see that difference, then consider this: how much luck has Colbert had getting people to write his name in for any actual public e

So what you're saying is that the 2 most powerful groups on the Internet are Stephen Colbert fans and 4chan users. Let us hope that they never come to virtual blows or it'll be the Internet Apocalypse! (Or at least very entertaining.)

More proof, if any were needed, that NASA is totally clueless about external communication & PR.Any kind of PR pro would have predicted this - its not like it has never happened before in public naming competitions and even elections.

So, suck it up guys. As another poster has pointed out, play the game and make it work for you.

What I cannot understand, though is why, in these cash-strapped times, they did not auction the name off? Could have raised some much-needed funds.

NASA is great at wasting money. Take a look at the ARES project compared to the Direct project. Instead of using existing engines, and existing boosters, and existing tankage, they've decided on using new engines, new boosters, etc. The ARES I can't even lift the Orion module into orbit. They've been trimming weight, and removing features from Orion just to make it light enough for ARES I to lift. As it is Orion will have to use its service module engines to make orbit, which cuts into its usefulness o

What I cannot understand, though is why, in these cash-strapped times, they did not auction the name off? Could have raised some much-needed funds.

Might have something to do with that being against the law.

Not that it would have done any good either way, as any funds raised that way go into a general fund and are doled back out by Congress. (Which is a feature, not a bug. It's designed to prevent federal agencies from circumventing the budget or selling off federal resources for personal or agency gain.)

They may see this as a precedent, toward full-blown corporate sponsorship. Fast forward: "NASA presents the Microsoft Mission to Mars, Version Four, bringing Microsoft Software to All Reaches of the Known Universe. Let's check in with Chief Bacteria Detection Evangelist, and Microsoft Executive Steven Sinofsky... any bugs up there?"

Something similar happened in The Netherlands, although on a smaller scale. Some company ran a contest to name a new type of potato chips (en-uk crisps) and internetters voted en masse for the name "WithoutStyle", after the similarly named blog [geenstijl.nl]. In the end, the company bended to the pressure, although for a short time only.

The first Colbert suggested by wikipedia is:Jean-Baptiste Colbert (1619 -> 1683), French minister of finance under King Louis XIV

This state servant was one of the primary artisan of the present French situation, where we have national or quasi-national big corps, with very tight links with the central administration.Colbertism, named after him, is a form of mercantilism where the good of the nation is only really the good of the ruling class.

Now, for international observers, perhaps your TV host is famous in the US, but US is not the world.

You would be the "international observer," Bunky. Slashdot is a US site which maintains a US perspective [slashdot.org].

Stephen Colbert is an American satirist who frequently pokes fun at the French for their pompousness, lack of humor, and nationalism. So, mer-see bow-coo for reminding us how much truth there is in his parodies...

OK, so NASA is unwilling to name the node after a living entertainer who regularly voices polarizing opinions. However, they want to save face and not appear to override the vote. Here's a solution: double down.

Allow Stephen Colbert (the character) to hold a second vote to select a Truthy, flag-waving name for the station. Stephen Colbert (the character) could have no end of fun with this. By closely controlling options in the second vote, NASA and Colbert (the person) could ensure a name that NASA coul

I'm from Minnesota. We elected Rudy Perpich and Jesse Ventura as governors. We elected Michele Bachmann as representative from the Si(x)th Congressional District. I've watched the hardest-hitting coverage of the last election on the Daily Show. I saw in the paper this morning that the courts have ruled only 400 more ballots will be recounted in the Senate race, making Al Franken's victory almost assured.

I think it's time we recognized the need for real comedians in our government structure. Now, Colbert is still alive and being funny, so he's not a good candidate for naming a government something after him, so I'm going to propose naming it after George Carlin.

... because, as has been pointed out, the people who spammed NASA's poll were less interested in what the module got named, and more in doing the bidding of Mr. Colbert. But what the hey. Let's go ahead and name it Colbert. (I just wonder what sort of copyright issues might come up out of this - can a government entity use a copyrighted name for a publicly funded project? Hmmm...)

I have a reason for suggesting we go ahead. There is one other person whose name is guaranteed to be associated with Earth, even

The civil war was about slavery and Lincoln's election, as an abolitionist Republican, arguably precipitated it even before he was sworn in, just like Obama's reputation as a liberal took the market for a nosedive.

For proof:

a) the confederate constitution is a copy of the us constitution, but, with a clause adding that slavery is a natural right and the government cannot ban slavery.

b) the most contentious issue between north and the south, was, in fact slavery. It existed with the infamous compromise in the original constitutional convention, with a series of incidents running all along the 1800's leading up to the civil war - bleeding kansas, dredd scott, the compromises.

c) abolition was the animating social issues of the day.

It's true that there were other issues. The south, being agrarian, favored free trade so they could buy cheaper British manufactured goods. The north was protectionist, and the south saw this as a sort of blackmail. As it is, the north became an economic powerhouse and won the war BECAUSE of its protectionism. This debate continues to this day. Right now the southern and agrarian ideas of free trade carry the day but the thing is, any study of history shows that free trade and a lack of workers rights makes you lose wars. Just ask the south.

Right now the southern and agrarian ideas of free trade carry the day but the thing is, any study of history shows that free trade and a lack of workers rights makes you lose wars. Just ask the south.

The South lose, in large part, because they had 1/2 the population of the North.

Then there was the railroad thing - the South didn't have much, and what it did wasn't connected conveniently for internal travel by rail.

And of course the lack of heavy industry - no cannon foundries means no cannons but what can be bought overseas.

And the State's Rights issues made federal level taxation nearly impossible, so the Confederacy had a bitch of a time paying for food, weapons, ammo for their armies. Which is why the Confederate armies were starving in the midst of a prosperous agrarian society.

Lot of reasons the South lost. Free Trade wasn't among them, nor was lack of workers' rights (note that they were significantly absent in the Union, Europe, and basically everywhere at that time).

The South started with more soldiers, officers, and munitions, because southerners were disproportionately represented in the military then to (when the "standing army" was basically an officer corp that you conscripted soldiers for).

An intriguing idea. But wrong. In the USA, we had a very tiny "long service professional" army before WW2. We didn't go the Officer Corps with conscript troops technique so common in Europe at the time.

And the South did NOT start the war with more soldiers. More officers,

Civil War was about States rights vs the rights of the Federal Government. Slavery just was the right that was most publicly in contention. In the North, it made an easy target; "See the evil slave holders!" In the South, from most historical accounts, it was more a of "Leave us alone. It's our decision." These were issues that went all the way back to the Revolutionary War and the Articles of Confederation. It's no accident that the South took the name of Confederate States of America. They wanted a s

Even if you look at how people identified themselves abroad back then. Northerners usually referred to them selves as Americans or from the US.

Hmmm, no actually it was common up North to be affiliated with one's state. Remember that states were actually responsible for raising forces for the union army back then. So you would have the New York and the PA and Massachusetts units all joining.

Civil War was about States rights vs the rights of the Federal Government. Slavery just was the right that was most publicly in contention. In the North, it made an easy target; "See the evil slave holders!" I

You know, I used to think so too, but the smoking gun for slavery is the confederate constitution. When the USA rebelled against the King, they put into the constitution things a system of government to prevent such abuses. When the South rebelled, they KEPT the US Constitution, and only altered it so that they were allowed to keep slaves.

Protectionism didn't win the war for the North any more then free trade or workers rights made the South lose it. What wins wars historically is three things, beans, boots, and bullets. Or to put it more succinctly, resources. The South lost because it needed to import most of it finished goods. The North didn't.

Point is, those industries do not exist unless they were protected. If those industries do not exist, the North is in the same boat as the South. But the North pursued a policy of developing native industrialization through protectionism, got the industry, and won the war. Protectionism worked.

Why should the ISS be any different? Screw it. It's all a joke, a sick joke, and a nation as feckless and emotional as ours deserves nothing better than a goddamn joke on one of our finer accomplishments.

Better a joke than stupid hero worship (I'm looking at you, Reagan International Airport). At least a joke name indicates that there is some thought going on.

Seriously, why shouldn't we honor someone who has helped millions of young Americans (1) enter the political discussion and (2) become aware of government folly. Colbert's more important to the zeitgeist than Serenity, that's for sure.

I think a lot of you are seriously overstating Colbert's contribution to society.

And just as many understate it. The Daily Show is the #1 source for political info among a large section of Americans. The Colbert Report isn't far behind.

It's like a gateway drug for young people. First they start watching the Colbert Report. Then they get hooked on the Daily Show. Then they start dabbling with the source, the talking head shows on MSNBC/CNN/etc. Pretty soon, they are waking up early on Sunday mornings

It would be such a waste for NASA not to use "Colbert". If he won the contest it just proves that he has more fans than NASA. They would be smart to take advantage of the publicity especially considering most people don't care too much about space exlporation during an economic crisis. It would probably be better for Colbert if they don't name it after him though. NASA will be a new punchline.